In this short book, Ballou defends the notion that non-resistance (today we call it non-violence) is the superior Christian method, and the one practiced by Jesus himself.

The Counter-Reformation, also called the Catholic Reformation, and remembered for its infamous Inquisition, was the period of Catholic resurgence which was initiated in response to the Protestant Reformation. Adolphus Ward writes, that it was "a movement pursuing two objects...the regeneration of the Church of Rome, and the recovery of the losses inflicted upon her by the early successes of Protestantism...The onset of the combat is marked by the formal establishment of the Jesuit Order as a militant...

The Story of Ahikar is a fictional work. It is a colorful story but considered to be a work containing great wisdom. The story of Ahikar is considered one of the earliest "international books". It can be found in a variety of geographical translations and has been circulated in the middle east and near east regions. - Summary by CJ Plogue

"As the heart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God." This thirst for an intimate relationship with God, claims A.W. Tozer, is not for a select few, but should be the experience of every follower of Christ. But, he asserts, it is all too rare when believers have become conditioned by tradition to accept standards of mediocrity, and the church struggles with formality and worldliness. Using examples from Scripture and from the lives of saints who lived with this thirst for God, Tozer sheds light on the path to a closer walk with God.

Compiled from the much larger 12 book set of "Butler's Lives of the Saints", this volume contains short biographies of the Saints, for each day of the year, followed by a reflection for each entry.

Even with the best intentions, we can often get caught up in the affairs of this world and forget about God. To stay on the path to Heaven we must make, from time to time, an examination of our life's heading. This collection of essays reminds us to live for God rather than for ourselves, encourages us to rise above the concerns and cares of our daily life, and places God's existence - rather than possessions or success - as the true meaning of our lives. . . . While he was the superior of the young Jesuits at Manresa House, Roehampton, Rev...

In this book, Schweitzer traces the historical progress of 'Historical Jesus' research, from Hermann Reimarus in the mid 18th century, to William Wrede at the turn of the 20th. Schweitzer showed how Jesus' image had changed with the times and with the personal proclivities of the various authors. He concluded with his own synopsis and interpretation of what had been learned over the course of the previous century. He took the position that the life of Jesus must be interpreted in the light of Jesus' own convictions, which he characterized as those of late Jewish eschatology. (Introduction from Wikipedia, modified by JoeD)

Surely the most deeply-rooted need of the human soul, its purest aspiration, is for the closest possible union with God. As one turns over the pages of this little work, written by Blessed Albert the Great towards the end of his life, when that great soul had ripened and matured, one feels that here indeed is the ideal of one's hopes. (From the Preface)

The Book of Lies, or Liber 333, is a holy book in the Western occult tradition of Thelema, consisting of 91 short chapters of poems, aphorisms, rituals, and metaphysics. This recording is of the original 1913 publication, and thus omits the further commentaries added by Crowley for subsequent additions. Those familiar with Crowley’s hermetic writings will recognize his subversive and playful style. Beneath the layers of symbolism, contradiction, and blasphemy lies a biting critique of the puritanical social, political, and religious values of the author’s generation.

It will be seen at a glance that this is not a life of Christ in the usual sense. It is not a review of the events of the earthly existence of our Lord. There is a greater life and a larger work of Christ of which his life on earth is but a single chapter. While no apology is needed for any publication of the great theme of the gospel, it may be stated that there is a special reason for such a book as this. The author has examined many works on Christ and lists of hundreds more, and has conferred with competent literary authorities, and has learned of few works, if any, covering this greater life and work of Christ...

Pope’s Essay on Man, a masterpiece of concise summary in itself, can fairly be summed up as an optimistic enquiry into mankind’s place in the vast Chain of Being. Each of the poem’s four Epistles takes a different perspective, presenting Man in relation to the universe, as individual, in society and, finally, tracing his prospects for achieving the goal of happiness. In choosing stately rhyming couplets to explore his theme, Pope sometimes becomes obscure through compressing his language overmuch...

This collection is first in a series of writings from the ante-Nicene Fathers' works. This first collection includes all the so-called Infancy narratives from the New Testament Apocrypha. - Summary by KevinS

This is the second volume of four which goes into the details of Characters from John Bunyan's books. This one continues with the characters of Pilgrims Progress.

Dumas's 'Celebrated Crimes' was not written for children. The novelist has spared no language -- has minced no words -- to describe the violent scenes of a violent time.In some instances facts appear distorted out of their true perspective, and in others the author makes unwarranted charges. The careful, mature reader, for whom the books are intended, will recognize, and allow for, this fact.The first volume comprises the annals of the Borgias and the Cenci. The name of the noted and notorious Florentine family has become a synonym for intrigue and violence, and yet the Borgias have not been without stanch defenders in history...

These are Alice Lady Lovat's meditations on the treatise "Del Aprecio y Estima de la Divina Gracia," written by the prolific Roman Catholic theologian and mystic Juan Eusebio Nieremberg, S.J. (1595-1658). Nieremberg's treatise was published in 1638 in Madrid, where he taught Sacred Scripture at the Jesuit Colegio Imperial. Abbot Oswald Hunter-Blair, O.S.B. wrote the preface for Lovat's book, which bears an imprimatur. (Introduction by dave7)

The Spirits' Book, published in French in 1857, is considered the most important book in the Spiritist philosophy. It contains the bases for that philosophy and all important points in its doctrine: the belief in God, reincarnation and the survival of the soul after death, the fact that it is through reincarnation that the soul learns and moves closer to perfection. The work is the first of a five book canon, and it is organized in the form of questions and answers, with commentary by the codifier, Allan Kardec, a pseudonym of Hippolyte Léon Denizard Rivail.

This 1871 revision of The Psalms by the American Bible Union is based on the “Common Version”, another name for the 1833 revision of the King James Version of The Bible by Noah Webster.

This Revised Testament has been prepared under the auspices of the American Bible Union, by the most competent scholars of the day. No expense has been spared to obtain the oldest translations of the Bible, copies of the ancient manuscripts, and other facilities to make the revision as perfect as possible. The paragraph form has been adopted in preference to the division by verse, which is a modern mode of division, never used in the ancient scriptures. But, for convenience of reference, the numbers of the verses are retained...

recording of Bible Passages Collection 003 with selections from the American Standard Version, King James Version, World English Bible, Emphasized, Bible, Catholic Public Domain Bible, Morgan New Testament, and Updated King James Version.

recording of Bible Passages Collection 002 with selections from the American Standard Version; King James Version ; World English Bible; Open English Bible; and Updated King James Version .

What can be said? It's the ASV Bible, copyrighted 1901 by Thomas Nelson & Sons. I have previously recorded the New Living Translation of the Bible and would now like to do this version in order to make the Holy Scriptures more available on.

Little Milly is left an orphan after the death of her mother and sent to live with her bachelor uncle, who has no use for children, especially of the female variety. As the days go by, his heart warms to his endearing niece who wants all probable sons to come home, including her very own probable uncle.

“In this book you will not find the stories of all God’s saints. I have gathered a few together, just as one gathers a little posy from a garden full of roses. But the stories I have chosen to tell are those that I hope children will love best to hear.” (excerpt from In God’s Garden by Amy Steedman)

The fourth century ascetic Paphnuce, journeys from his remote desert hermitage to urban Alexandria determined to locate the stunningly beautiful and libertine actress, Thais. He earnestly desires that she convert to Christianity. Gaining an audience by deception, the hermit passionately speaks to the actress of eternity. Remarkably, Thais repents and retires to a convent for the rest of her days. The hermit however, cannot rid his mind of her charms, not even with the help of the most severe austerities. After years of anguish the monk learns of Thais' immanent demise and hastens to her side. There he confesses the unspeakable.

Anatole France, in his satirical and allegorical fashion, weaves a tale of fantasy which finds a mischievous guardian angel stealing books from his earthly charge, who happens to be an archbishop in possession of a plethora of literature, mostly theological in nature. After voracious reading and then becoming a "fallen" angel, he decides to search for and recruit other "fallen" angels who devise a plan to attempt an overthrow of the rule which had set their fate, realizing that revolt is necessary and inevitable...

These are short stories about the life of Ulysses, the stealing of Helen, Paris, battles, Trojan horses, and more!

CUSTOM AND MYTHINTRODUCTION.Though some of the essays in this volume have appeared in various serials, the majority of them were written expressly for their present purpose, and they are now arranged in a designed order. During some years of study of Greek, Indian, and savage mythologies, I have become more and more impressed with a sense of the inadequacy of the prevalent method of comparative mythology. That method is based on the belief that myths are the result of a disease of language, as the pearl is the result of a disease of the oyster...

This is a series of short messages written by the South African minister, Andrew Murray. They deal with the necessity and joy of surrendering our lives completely to God.

A book on the all importance of humility, how Jesus was humble, and how we also can become humble. Murray wrote “Without humility, there can be no true abiding in God’s presence or experience of His favor and the power of His spirit. Without it there can be no abiding faith or love or joy or strength.”

It is under a deep impression that the place and power of prayer in the Christian life is too little understood, that this book has been written. I feel sure that as long as we look on prayer chiefly as the means of maintaining our own Christian life, we shall not know fully what it is meant to be. But when we learn to regard it as the highest part of the work entrusted to us, the root and strength of all other work, we shall see that there is nothing that we so need to study and practise as the art of praying aright...

Andrew Murray describes the necessity and benefits of absolute obedience to God. He goes on to explain the way to achieve this level of obedience, which is required of all believers, and attainable through God’s provision.

If you were put on trial for being a Christian, would you be convicted? Christians have asked themselves this question, or ones like it, for millennia. In his book, The Deeper Christian Life, Andrew Murray helps us come to grips with those nagging insecurities in our Christian walk. A shallow relationship with God leads us down a road of doubt and insecurities. Can I be forgiven? How can I forgive? Murray tells us that we can go deeper in our relationship with God, and with that deeper relationship comes growing confidence and joy in the gospel. That joy springs from the knowledge of God's grace in forgiving us, and enables us to extend that grace to others in our lives.

Murray suggests that his devotional, The Lord's Table, is not meant to replace scripture, but rather to strengthen believers' appreciation of God's word. Murray's meditations provide a thoughtful guide for believers who desire to develop a deeper understanding of the Lord's Holy Supper. The devotional covers the week before, during, and after the Supper, and each entry is labeled with the day of the week so that readers can manage devotions with ease. Murray first explains how believers can prepare to receive God's blessing during the weeks before the Supper...

Andrew Murray's True Vine is a thirty-one day devotional focusing on Christ's Parable of the Vine and the Branches in John 15. The devotional for each day, though short, elaborates and expounds upon John 15, providing spiritual insight along the way. Murray repeats important themes--like abiding in Christ--throughout the different days. Noticing how they develop and grow with each successive read, countless small groups and individuals have found Murray's keen spiritual teachings fruitful. An excellent devotional, True Vine is recommended for daily spiritual nourishment.

In introducing this book, which Andrew Murray sub-titled “Thoughts on the Calling of God’s Children to Be Holy as He is Holy”, I can do no better than to quote from the author’s own Preface: “It has been my earnest desire that I might be a helper of the faith of my brethren in seeking to trace with them the wondrous revelation of God’s Holiness through the ages as recorded in His blessed Word. It has been my continual prayer that God might use what is written to increase in His children the conviction that we must be holy, the knowledge of how we are to be holy, the joy that we may be holy, the faith that we can be holy...

Is it possible to be familiar with Jesus, to know the Bible, to be involved in church life, and yet not really know Jesus at all well? Andrew Murray, with his perceptive insights into the church of his day, and indeed of ours too, shows how this is all too often the condition of many believers. In the two essays comprising this book, Murray shows how we can move to a new place in really knowing Jesus, and how the presence of the Lord can become much more real to us. There is a cost, but God always abundantly rewards those who seek Him with their whole heart.

Here is a book of devotions that will bring joy and strength. Its chapters provide vital keys to living and enjoying the Christian life. It covers important disciplines such as prayer, study, meditation and feeding on the Scriptures as a means of maintaining intimacy with God - without which our spiritual lives can all too easily become impoverished. Andrew Murray shows in this book a number of steps by which we can be wonderfully renewed in our inner life day by day.

In all the writings of the late nineteenth century minister and writer Andrew Murray, we see his passion for reality in the lives of Christian believers. In this series of addresses he explains how, in various areas of the spiritual life, one may grow in God and experience more of his power. In particular he shows the importance of Christ truly being given his rightful place in the believer’s life. There are chapters on: carnal Christians, the self life, waiting on God, entrance into rest, the...

Andrew Murray’s practical and devotional writings on the Bible have been a help and blessing to Christian believers for more than a century. In this powerfully written book, Murray takes up the subject of healing as revealed in Scripture, showing how the work of Jesus Christ embraces not only pardon for sin but also healing from sickness.

Andrew Murray wrote this volume as a sequel to his well-known devotional book "Abide in Christ". It is sub-titled "Thoughts on the Blessed Life of Conformity to the Son of God". In his preface, Murray states two objects he had in mind in writing the book. The first was to portray the Son of God as a pattern of what God the Father wants believers to be, in such a way that we can see that being like Jesus is immensely attractive in awakening love, inspiring hope and strengthening faith. The second was to show how likeness to Christ is not a mere ideal, but something very real in life of believers as we reflect His image amid the trials and duties of daily life...

Andrew Murray opens his Introduction to the book with these words: "The message which this little book brings is simple but most solemn. It is to the effect that the one thing needful for the Church, and the thing which, above all others, men ought everywhere to seek for with one accord and with their whole heart, is to be filled with the Spirit of God." Jesus said "He that believeth on Me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his heart shall flow rivers of living water". In Murray's words, it is as we yield our hearts to the leading of the Holy Spirit to know Christ and look at Him, and believe in what is revealed, that the Spirit can take possession of us...

"The Holiest of All" is a devotional exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews. It was written towards the end of the nineteenth century and has since become a classic. Its pages lead the reader into a practical understanding of who Christ is, the power of his finished work on the Cross and his present intercession for believers. The author demonstrates how it is only a full understanding of who Jesus is and what he does for us that can bring us into a full and complete Christian life.

Andrew Murray sub-titled this book "A Plea for More Prayer". In it, he shows how throughout Scripture, in the life of every saint, and that of God’s own Son, and all through Church history, God is, first of all, a prayer-hearing God. He builds upon the truths brought out in his earlier volume “With Christ in the School of Prayer”, by showing firstly that Christ meant prayer to be the great power by which His Church should do its work, and secondly that we have far too little conception of the place that intercession, as opposed to praying just for our own needs, should have in the Church and in the Christian life...

Towards the close of his ministry on earth, Jesus taught his disciples of the need for them to abide in Him. This word "abide" speaks of the intimacy of fellowship with the Master to which his followers are still invited. Andrew Murray wrote this series of meditations, which he subtitled "Thoughts on the Blessed Life of Fellowship with the Son of God", out of a conviction that many believers are missing out on something that is really at the heart of a healthy Christian life. The author explains...

In this book, Andrew Murray explores the dynamics of the Christian life as Jesus means it to be lived. He explains how the Holy Spirit is essential to living effectively as a believer. Christians are often all too well aware of the feebleness of their life and testimony. This most encouraging book, consisting of a series of lectures given to students at the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago in 1895, shows how the working of the Holy Spirit in the Christian’s life makes all the difference. It shows how God’s power is made perfect in weakness, and how His Holy Spirit may animate and renew every area of the believer’s life.

Andrew Murray wrote in the introduction to this daily devotional book of one month’s readings, of the need that many Christians feel of being helped to a deeper and clearer insight into all that Christ could be to them. In this volume he shows both the need and the benefit of waiting upon God, and of giving God time and place to show us what He can do and what He will do. The author encourages us to enlarge our hearts and not limit God; to understand that God can do new things, unheard of things, and hidden things. “When Thou camest down, Thou didst terrible things we looked not for; the mountains flowed down at Thy presence.”

“We have become so accustomed to limit the wonderful love and the large promises of our God, that we cannot read the simplest and clearest statements of our Lord without the qualifying clauses by which we guard and expound them”. This is what Andrew Murray writes in the preface to this practical and scriptural volume on the practice of prayer. This book has been of tremendous help to generations of believers as they have sought a more effective prayer life. It opens with the words of the disciples, “Lord, teach us to pray”. And so opens the school of prayer to which believers are invited. - Summary by Christopher Smith

Andrew Murray wrote “Working for God”, a book of daily meditations for a month, as a sequel to “Waiting on God”. The object of the book is, in Murray’s own words, to remind all Christian workers of the greatness and the glory of the work in which God gives a share. It is the work of bringing people back to God – but it must be done in God’s way and in God’s power. It is spiritual work, to be done by spiritual people. In this book we find valuable insights into the calling that all Christians have, to work for the Lord in some capacity or other...

Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824) was a German Augustinian nun who had visions about Christ's life and death. This book relates her visions regarding the Blessed Virgin Mary, from her marriage to St. Joseph to the events surrounding the birth of Christ.(Introduction by Ann Boulais)

My Path to Atheism is a remarkable document in many ways, not least that it was written by a woman in Victorian England, not the most open free-thinking of societies, especially for women at that time. It needed a remarkable woman to write such a revolutionary and to 19th century minds, heretical document in a society where the Church had such a stronghold. Besant herself was originally married to a clergyman, but her increasingly anti-religious views and writings led to a legal separation. She went...

When Bethany Hallam travels to Chattanooga for the League Conference, she meets David Herschel, who challenges her thinking and changes her views about her missionary obligations to God's "chosen people." ( Esther ben Simonides)

The Cloud of Unknowing (Middle English: The Cloude of Unknowyng) is an anonymous work of Christian mysticism written in Middle English in the latter half of the 14th century. The text is a spiritual guide on contemplative prayer in the late Middle Ages. The book counsels a young student to seek God, not through knowledge and intellection (faculty of the human mind), but through intense contemplation, motivated by love, and stripped of all thought. This is brought about by putting all thoughts and desires under a "cloud of forgetting", and thereby piercing God's cloud of unknowing with a "dart of longing love" from the heart...

Here is a collection of 365 short spiritual reflections and moral admonitions of Saint Francis of Assisi (1182-1226) and other notable Franciscans. One might conclude that, while some of these admonitions are applicable to almost anyone, others seem too rigorous, or at least inappropriate for certain vocations or stations in life. This may be explained by recalling that these words of advice and spiritual direction were directed primarily to friars and cloistered nuns. Thus, we detect in these words a great concern for the development of profound personal humility, meekness, celibate chastity, and sorrow for sin...

"The Curtezan unmasked or, the Whoredomes of Jezebel Painted to the Life: With Antidotes against them, or Heavenly Julips to cool Men in the Fever of Lust" is a fire-and-brimstone polemic by "A Spiritual Physician" to persuade young men not to succumb to harlotry and its accompanying perils. (Introduction by Denny Sayers)

A catechism is a summary of the principles of Christian religion and articles of the faith. The Baltimore Catechism specifically was the de facto standard Catholic school text in the United States from 1885 to the late 1960s. It was the first such catechism written for Catholics in North America, replacing a translation of Bellarmine's Small Catechism. The Baltimore Catechism remained in use in nearly all Catholic schools until many moved away from catechism-based education, though it is still used up to this day in some. (Summary by Wikipedia)

The Chymical Wedding of Christian Rosenkreutz was edited in 1616 in Strasbourg (annexed by France in 1681). It is the third of the original manifestos of the mysterious "Fraternity of the Rose Cross" (Rosicrucians). NOTE: It was translated into English for the first time in 1690 by E. Foxcroft. This translation became the source for many of the modern attempts to improve the original. The translation presented here is that of E. Foxcroft. Although the book first appeared in 1616, the story takes place over 150 years earlier...

Go through the year in the footsteps of the saints. This book emphasizes one virtue for each month with quotes and stories from the lives of the saints to help teach and inspire that particular virtue in us.For January, Perfection; February, Humility; March, Mortification; April, Patience; May, Meekness; June, Obedience; July, Simplicity; August, Diligence; September, Prayer; October, Confidence; November, Charity; and December, Union.